Charybdis IX Uprising
|name=Charybdis IX Uprising |image= |conflict= |date=November 17th, 2513-January 5th, 2514 |place= |result= Defeat |side1= |side2= |side3= |side4= |commanders1= *Major Dominic Piontek *Various Lieutenants |commanders2= *Governor Andrew Hopper† *Lieutenant Governor Elijah Riggs *Admiral Francis Hines |commanders3= |commanders4= |forces1= *Several thousand civilian fighters *Rogue Colonial Militia and CMA troops (1,590 troops) *Assorted Insurrectionist cells (982 insurgents) *CMA Armstrong |forces2= *Loyal Colonial Militia and CMA troops (1,894 troops) *Local Law Enforcement *12th Marine Battalion (1,250 Marines) *Battlegroup Apollo **UNSC Abankin **UNSC Hood **UNSC Andromeda |forces3= |forces4= |casual1= *Several thousand casualties *CMA Armstrong |casual2= *UNSC Abankin heavily damaged *About 1,600 casualties |casual3= |casual4= }} The Charybdis IX Uprising was a conflict on the colony of from 2513 to 2514. After a period of protests and protests that turned violent in the city of against the corporations that ran the planet, the colonial government ordered in the to aid the police in keeping riots contained. However, this action only served to intensify the violence, as citizens became angry that the government was interfering with militiamen in the city. As the protests grew more and more violent, the colonial government, terrified of the possibility of a full on civil war, ordered in troops from the planet's garrison to keep the riots and protests under control as much as possible. However, as time went on, the Colonial Militia and CMA troops found a common cause with the protestors, and a large percentage allied with them. In early 2513, when the original leader of the protestors died of cancer, one of the rebellious CMA officers, Major Dominic Piontek, took over. Piontek, a far less diplomatic man than the previous leader, incited the groups to more and more violent riots. Two months after taking over, Piontek and a group of CMA troops started an armed firefight with the city's police during a protest. Rallying the rest of the protestors, and even the planet to his cause, the rebellion spread through the ranks of the rest of the colonial troops on the planet. For two weeks, the colonial government attempted to subdue the rebels with its remaining forces, but was unable to, and eventually contacted the UNSC, who sent troops in to stop the Insurrection. For the next month, battles raged across Charybdis IX, with Scyllion experiencing heavy street to street fighting that left a massive toll on its population and infrastructure. Although the UNSC was eventually victorious, this set the stage for later rebellions on the planet during the late 2520s and early to mid 2530s. Prelude to War The issues that led to the Charybdis IX Uprising began years before, during the corporate takeover of the planet in the early 2500's. As the corporations set up towns for their new workers, eventually the workers were unable to pay off the debts they had accumulated, as their wages were simply insufficient to cover the cost of living. Due to these problems, workers began to strike against the companies for better pay in order to keep paying their cost of living. As many of these peaceful protests became more and more violent, the police departments, especially in the epicenter of the protests, the capital of were unable to cope with the increasing workload, and so petitioned the colonial government in 2512 for aid in helping control the protests. At the cities' requests, the government ordered the local units to aid the police in controlling the violence. Although it worked at first, within the groups were quick to take advantage of the use of the militia, stating it was the prelude to a police state on the colony, where, "...people would disappear in the middle of the night and never be seen again", according to one supporter of the rebels' view. As the riots grew more and more heated, the government, desperate to control the growing violence, ordered in troops from the planet's garrison in early 2513 to aid the now stretched-thin Colonial Militia and local law enforcement. As the protests continued and the colonial troops began to interact with the protestors, a large group of the former found common cause with the latter, and became supporters of their cause, including CMA Major Dominic Piontek, who resigned his commission and became a fervent proponent of the protestors' views. In September of 2513, the original leader of the protestors, William Marson, died of a heart attack, and left the position of leader to Piontek. Piontek, a far less diplomatic man than Marson, urged colonial troops in Scyllion to defect to their cause, and began to advocate independence for the planet, by any means necessary. Order of Battle First Engagements The beginning of the Uprising started on November 17th, 2513, when a unit of CMA troops who had been swayed to the side of the dissidents, attached to a Scyllion Police Department riot control unit, opened fire on the SPD officers after the protest they were assigned to contain turned into a full-blown riot, killing twelve of the twenty one officers, and forcing the rest to retreat. Within days, the troops' rebellion spread throughout the garrison's ranks, including to the crew of the CMA Armstrong, the lone frigate assigned to defend the colony, who mutinied and took control of the ship. After the initial firefights within the capital, Governor Andrew Hopper attempted to flee the city in fear of his life. However, as he was nearing the edge of the city, his motorcade was ambushed by a group of rebel insurgents, and he was killed in the ensuing ambush. His lieutenant governor, Elijah Riggs, however, survived, and became the governor of the planet. Gathering up the commanders of the colony's garrison, Riggs relinquished command of the remaining CMA troops who were loyal to them, in hopes they would subdue the rebellion. But, it was too little, too late, and, after a week and a half of bloody fighting, Riggs contacted the and requested they send troops to put down the uprising. UNSC Intervention On December 2nd, the UNSC forces, accompanied by Battlegroup Apollo, arrived in orbit above the planet. The now rebel controlled CMA Armstrong, opened fire with its and other weapons batteries, heavily damaging the UNSC Abankin, before the UNSC launched a counterstrike, which annihilated the Armstrong before it was able to fire another salvo. With the rebels' space threat eliminated, the UNSC began landing the 12th Marine Battalion on the colony to aid in suppressing the rebels. Although the rebels on the frontier and in smaller settlements initiated a policy of guerilla warfare, the Marines took less casualties than expected, and were able to quickly take back almost all the ground the rebels had captured in the initial stages of the uprising. The final battle of the Charybdis IX Uprising occurred from December 24th, 2513 to January 5th of 2514 in the capital of Scyllion, where the rebels had set up in preparation for a drawn out urban battle. Despite all the rebels' preparations, their plan was thrown into chaos when , launched from UNSC ships in orbit, landed behind their lines and began to wreak havoc, before the remaining UNSC and colonial military forces moved in. Although a large majority of rebels either surrendered without a fight or melted back into the civilian populace, some fervent groups held out for days, until the final holdouts within the capital building, led personally by Piontek, finally surrendered to the UNSC. Aftermath Although the Uprising was put down fairly quickly by the UNSC, it paved the way for more civil strife on Charybdis, including the May Riots during the initiation of martial law in 2533, and the , led by one of Piontek's lieutenants , in 2535, as well as rebellions staged on it even in the post war era.